Deputy head of the Government Office joins VEB to follow state funds
Pyotr Netreba, Yelena Kiselyova
The White House is sending reinforcements to the Bank for Development and Foreign Economic Relations (Vnesheconombank or VEB): January 1, 2009 Mikhail Kopeikin, the deputy head of the Government Office, will take the post of the Bank's deputy board chairman. The man who has for many years upheld the idea of economic development through state investments will monitor it and at the same time tighten government control over anti-crisis resources distributed through VEB.
A source on the Bank's supervisory board told Kommersant that Kopeikin's appointment was approved last Monday. Putin, who is the board chairman, also supported the decision. Kommersant contacted other sources in Government departments that unofficially confirmed the news.
"One should not view this decision as a bonus to a loyal functionary left out in the cold after the Cabinet shake-up," said a source on the VEB council. "Kopeikin will not only get a high status position, but also take an active part in VEB activity as a board member." According to the source, early next year board management will rotate, and its deputy chairman Anatoly Zabaznov will step down. Kopeikin's responsibilities have not yet been defined, he said.
Officially, Vnesheconombank, as well as the White House, declined to comment Friday on the personnel changes, but made no denials. Kopeikin, too, refused to talk about his plans.
Kopeikin, one of the most experienced Government economists, started his career in 1996 as head of the economic and investment department in Viktor Chernomyrdin's Government. He survived eight Cabinet shake-ups. In the spring of 2000 and in 2008, he twice filled a post in Putin's Government. In 2003, Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov moved him a notch up - from department head to deputy head of the Government Office.
By the beginning of his White House term, Kopeikin had an enviable resume: diplomas from the Ordzhonikidze Institute of Management, the Higher Economic Courses at the USSR State Planning Committee, the Scandinavian Centre for Maintenance Management in Stockholm, and the Joint Vienna Institute. He worked at the USSR State Planning Committee and in the Economics Ministry of the Russian Federation. While still in the White House, he defended a doctoral thesis to become Professor of the Higher School of Economics and Merited Economist of Russia. In 2008, he was awarded the Order for Services to the Fatherland, 4th Class.
Kopeikin reached the peak of his fame during Mikhail Fradkov's era. In December 2004, he was the first among top-placed officials to suggest a drastic cut in the VAT, down to 13%. In 2006, he engaged in a public polemic with Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin concerning the use of the Stabilisation Fund. He argued that the model chosen by the Finance Ministry would lose the country 600 billion roubles. While working in Putin's Government he never made a public appearance. His duty was to look after the federal budget, taxes and sovereign debt. He also dealt with investment policy, financial markets, bankruptcies, insurance, pensions, social welfare, national projects, and the environment.
Sources close to one of the Deputy Prime Ministers explain Kopeikin's transfer by the need for greater state control over the state-owned bank, which has recently become an anti-crisis manager and a distributor of budget funds. He is the second Government functionary to receive a job in VEB as deputy chairman and board member this year. In January 2008, Mikhail Sinelin (in charge of information policy) filled similar posts in VEB. In 1998-2007, he worked as head of the Prime Minister's Secretariat in the White House.
"VEB plays a key role in distributing state funding, and reinforcing its operating staff with government officials is inevitable," the source said. "Especially since VEB needs more and more competent people to sit on the boards of companies that apply for refinancing their external debt," he said.
Now Kopeikin will himself follow through on most issues of Putin's anti-crisis plan, which he helped formulate. He will perhaps be the first of White House functionaries to translate into practice his theory that state capital investments could replace foreign investments. Another believer in this approach, former Deputy Economics Minister Kirill Androsov, will continue to oversee these matters at the White House in the same post as Kopeikin, or deputy head of the Government Office.
